Wisconsin Election Board just received the Green Party's petition for a recount!!! Whew--I was getting worried--not 20 minutes to go! And the funding is up over $5.1 million now. Yay!!! Thank you so much for your bravery, Jill Stein! Now we have to hope that Wisconsin courts or legislature can't and won't block it in any way.

And Trump hasn't twitted his displeasure because he doesn't want this news to be the top most talked about headline news for days, allowing the idea that he might have stolen the election to become mainstream. And this happening right after the NYT got him to disavow his most rambunctious Nazi followers--darn, what bad timing for him! :-P

Happy Thanksgiving Day! I hope all who celebrate are having a good one. And to those who don't, OK, you can have a good day too. I'm so grateful to have all my friends here--I'm not sure how you all fit yourselves into my tiny macbook air, but I'm glad you did. <3

Another October pic I took by the lake.

I had a yummy T-Day meal with zlabya and her DH and her BF. I made my signature salad, and she made a yummy chicken, sweet potato casserole, and apple crisp. Excellent company to hang out with.

Auditing the Vote

If you missed the news, Jill Stein, the Green Party candidate for US President started raising funds yesterday to audit and recount the votes in Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania. Best comment ever reported as seen on twitter by ambree40: lanyard @lanyardigan 8h8 hours ago: Please, God: like Gollum, let Jill Stein have a totally unforeseen and critical purpose. :-D

I contributed yesterday and watching it grow has been so exciting--they're up to $4.3 million and counting. Go here if you want to contribute or just watch the donations flood in.

A decade back I was following the voting integrity push, belonged to Common Cause, and presented a paper to Congresspeople involved in the movement. When I canvassed for John Kerry down in Florida on election weekend, I listened to poll workers who saw voting machines flip their votes from Kerry to Bush.

We've made great strides in creating a paper trail in many districts in this country to check these problems, but paper backup ballots don't do any good if you never audit and take a look at them. It's just a gigantic green flag to hackers, Russian gov't connected or from anywhere, if they know we're not verifying the optical scanners by checking some of the paper ballots. We should be auditing a sampling of ballots in every state before we announce the count, and we should get used to not having instant gratification and wait a week or 3 before announcing a winner, as grueling as it would have felt to do that this year.

So, without getting my hopes too high that they will find something that will overturn the horrid results of this election (but seeing that Trump has a pattern of doing the things he accuses others of and Bannon is involved with data-mining operations, how could we not check this out), the recount here is just a needed thing to ensure the integrity of the vote. As long as we're having elections close enough that one side wins the electors and the other side the popular vote, vote audits should be made an automatic procedure through legislation. We're doing a good thing here, whatever the outcome of the recount.

I know this is a return to the denial and bargaining phase of grief, but a bunch of sites are picking up this story now, and whether or not it is a hoax, making the phone call is worth a shot. The count is so close in these states, and they haven't finished Michigan's count yet. Right now at 11pm ET the 202 number is busy, but you can get right through to the 1-800 number--I got through immediately--maybe it is easier to connect late in the evening and off hours and read the script below:

Please take one minute and call/email the DOJ -Department of Justice- : 1-800-253-3931 (press 5) or 202-353-1555 (leave message)

email: voting.section@usdoj.gov

"My name is [first last name], I'm calling from [city],[state] to respectfully request you pursue an investigation into voter suppression, Russian collusion and FBI interference with the 2016 presidential election. Please issue an injunction until a thorough investigation can take place."

The point is to provide the DOJ with numbers so they can say X number of Americans want an injunction. Short, sweet, polite does the trick.

I'm so sorry this is a day late post, hon, but I wanted to wish a very happy birthday to my dearest friend mererid!!! I hope the birthday dinner was excellent and you're having a good Sunday. I still have many pics from my trip out there last February that I haven't posted yet, so here's a couple:

6:02 pm - Hopeful things in the political morass the US got itself into

George Takei is wonderful, as usual, and writes the definitive op-ed on why what Trump backer Chris Higbie said was so evil. I'm also impressed and fangrrling Megyn Kelly, whose interview with Higbie is linked in Takei's essay, for not letting that comment slip by and highlighting it with the full loathing it deserves and that even any Fox News lover will get. There's a reason Trump tried to take her down, and he failed because she stood up to him, and she's being fabulous and making some changes in Fox News and what their viewers are exposed to. We'll see where she goes from here, but I'm glad to see her on our side for the present and that gives me hope.

I'm also glad Higbie went there and connected the Muslim registry plan with internment camps for us so we didn't have to--thank you, Higbie!!! This gives Dems and civil liberties advocates much more leverage to defeat Trump's plans to make Muslim Americans second class citizens. So go ahead, keep working with loose tongued bigots--make our day.

What Trump is doing with setting his cabinet is not going to fly when he is dealing with Congress and has to learn to share power with the other boys and girls, and that's when things will get really interesting. I'm hopeful it will go about as well as how he's run his businesses. And I am really hoping for big time buyer's remorse in 2018 from the mostly white minority of the public that voted for him and the Republicans he may or may not work with. When the buyer's remorse sets in, I expect they will start taking note of the disgusting things Trump and his minions are saying a little more, not a lot, but a little.

Also, I don't think the argument will really fly, but here's a petition urging the appointment of Merrick Garland to the Supreme Court you can sign. I really wish people were in the streets protesting in the spring when McConnell made clear the Republicans would block any appointment the President made, no matter how far to the right he bended--it would have been a more useful time than now, but any time is a start.

So I'm more hopeful on the political front today and I've got a Tuxie curled up next to me, took a beautiful walk around the lake, and will join a friend to see a local band play around the corner this evening. Yay Froday, my dears! <3

From a great snarky op-ed in the Washington Post about Steve Bannon by Alexandra Petri:

I have no doubt that a real racist sexist chauvinist white supremacist will be easy to spot. “I am coming for minorities now,” he will say. “I am an actual racist. I am, literally, Hitler, or at the very least Goebbels.”

Read the whole piece here. It's fun and thinky. And no, no giving him a chance--he's made himself perfectly clear already where he stands and it's hateful and a danger to democracy.

I called my Congresspeople, Senator Barbara Mikulski and Rep Steny Hoyer today to ask them to protest the appointment of Steve Bannon, that he has every right to publish alt-right screeds, but I do not want him in my government and how frightened to the core his being there makes me. As lbilover said we cannot allow them to normalize what Trump is doing, let alone white supremacists and neo-nazis as viable representatives of our democracy.

Thanks to rydra_wong for the quick links and she has many more good links on why it is better to call than email our Congresspeople or sign petitions, why it is better to call them at their state offices rather than the above linked DC offices, and script ideas in her post here. But just stick to calling the DC offices if doing the extra work to get the state offices will delay you or use up more spoons than you have.

And since I've been seeing sexist arguments on the left that it's too risky now to run a woman for president in the immediate future, block that noise and if you have more funds, contribute to Emily's List. Since Christian extremists have long been normalized in US government and are now in control, Planned Parenthood needs funds now more than ever.

I'm really sad about the untimely passing of Gwen Ifill. Her voice was part of the soundtrack for my maturing political awareness. What a hard week to pass on, but probably a hastener for letting go. Safe passage and rest in peace.

Light Beyond the Gate. Yesterday's sunset by the lake before the moonrise.

I watched the President's press conference, and his looking like he was controlling himself from laughing at how unprepared Trump is was kind of heartening, his "just wait--he wont' know what hit him" look. I really hope infighting will render him and his cabinet ineffectual in a way that lessons the harm they will try to enact. Hope is all we have.

A very happy birthday to my dear exuberant friend ekaterin24 aka zlabya!!!! I'm so glad we've gotten to be friends the last year--having you nearby makes my life so much better and fuller. I hope you've had a great birthday. Here is a sparkler tree for you as a birthday candle on an earth cake:

A tulip poplar pretending to be one of Gandalf's fireworks--the one behind the fire station I told you to look up at, but taken a week ago. And here's your birthday moon:

The supermoon rising over Greenbelt Lake a quarter hour after sunset this evening. Not that I can tell if it's any bigger than a regular full moon. If you look really close, you can see a gray dot along the shoreline a half inch from the left side of the pic--that's a great blue heron who just landed.

I also want to wish a happy belated birthday to just_ann_now! I hope it was a good one and there's a closer supermoon pic below for you.

Today I went to a brunch and movie in DC with my Jewish Lesbian group--it wound up being just 2 of us. But kibitzing over brunch and seeing a good movie was just what I needed today. We saw Denial with Rachel Weisz. It's about the 1996 trial in the UK between historian Deborah Lipstadt and Holocaust denier David Irving who was claiming libel against her. Wonderfully paced and well done.

I listened to interviews with Bernie Sanders and Michael Moore about the election on the radio on the way home, and they were calming. Then I took a walk and snapped the above supermoon pic and the one below the cut. So a much better day than the rest of the post-election week (excepting a lovely walk with zblaya on Friday and talking with ya'll.)

I've been moving around in a fog and just can't get it together. I swam today and have no idea how many laps I did in 45 minutes--just couldn't keep track. And I've been getting to bed too late and up too late. Poor kitties. I will get myself to bed on time tonight and try to get myself back on schedule and hopefully that will help and I can put myself back together. I have no idea what stage of grief this is. I'm a slow processor. Others still in the same place?

If the stats are good in this article (and that's a big "if" until we see more discussion on and examination of this, and the results are still not all in), only 55% of eligible voters bothered to vote in this election--the lowest turnout in 20 years.

The good news is that only a quarter of eligible voters voted for Trump, so less than a quarter of the population. So 3/4 of the US did not approve Trump nor wanted him. Most USians just stood by in their not-my-problem-field and let it happen. Which is really the US I know. And it's oddly comforting.

At least I will be oddly comforted by the part that was not the result of voter suppression efforts that kept people of color from getting to the polls. And I really want to find out who is doing the best work to investigate all cases of voter suppression and donate--I suspect that would be the Southern Poverty Law Center, but maybe there's another organization working on this. Any ideas, flisties?

So keep in mind that most people will stand by and do nothing if the Trumpies come for us, but there are still more of us who are working to resist than there are Trumpies since Hillary did win the popular vote. Trump only represents 1/4 of our voting public, not nearly a half of the voters. I am really relieved that this could be the result of low turnout and apathy and not a surge of new voters coming out of the woodwork. The shadow is a passing thing. But only if we work to discourage more nonvoters to join his ranks.

Our best hope is that some of these nonvoters are surprised and horrified by Trump's win enough and all he and his minions do to horrify us all further that a few of them will come out and join us for midterm elections in 2018 and get rid of Trump and Pence in 2020.

Do not stop harping on the fact that Hillary won the popular vote every chance you get and a slim amount of voters could have changed the electoral vote. Every vote really does count. We only need a few of them to wake up out of their stupors to get our country back in 4 years. We need to keep ringing the alarms and help pull them out of bed.

If you have the spoons, we need to prod the press because they are lazy and myopic, and Trump's people know how to prod them, but Dem's aren't so good at it.

I just copied and sent that list of hate incidents with it's reference links compiled by momsrising.org that I posted here last night and sent it to the Washington Post under their contact email for story ideas. Maybe someone at that org has done that, but maybe not.

If you have the spoons, you can do the same with your regional or national news outlets of your choice by looking up their contact emails. It's worth a try. They're reporting on violence at anti-Trump rallies, but not presenting this info because it takes work and tracking to compile these incidents and make the connections.

10:32 pm - Alert: White Supremacist Harassment and Violence Against Everybody Else in the US

Just got this list of several incidents of violence and harassment happening all around the US from a momsrising.org email. Click on the first link under the cut to sign a petition calling on Trump to basically call off his dogs. The bottom links are to the sites listing the incidents. Pass on. Be vigilant, my friends.

Happy Birthday, lovethosehobbit!!! I hope it's a great one. Bet moving to the leftmost peninsula off the mainland of this country in a blue state never felt like a better idea! You are one smart woman! May it be the best birthday ever to start off a great year for you.

Here are 3 pics from the lake here for you, from a couple of weeks ago, when the world was still young:

There are so many horrible and deplorable white people and misogynists in this country and they won last night.

And let's not fall for the classist narrative that a lot of the press is upholding. Do not ignore that statistics show that the backbone of Trump's support is the same as Republicans have always had--wealthy people of varying education levels, mostly white men and the women who love and are related to them, and their only concern is to not pay taxes. They do not care who gets thrown under the bus as long as they keep all their stuff. They are supported by poor white people who hope to be them one day, but they are not the backbone--the wealthy and well off are and they are very quiet about what they are doing. They do not attend political rallies--they make phone calls and transfer money.

We have to go on and look out for each other and those more vulnerable than us. It's going to be harder still for a while. The fight continues.

We are in need of magic today, so I went down to the lake at the day's last light and found the Lady of the Golden Wood had gifted my shire with a mallorn, and you can see its reflection in her mirror, an image of hope. We need that last light. As the Galadhrim of Lothlorien say, if the Sindarin here is correct, amin naa yassen he`.

That would be translated, of course, as "I'm with her" in the Common tongue.